Friday, February 11, 2005

Jack Higgins

I'm a big Jack Higgins fan. Not necessarily of his latest books, but of what I like to think of as his "middle period." Back in 1974 I picked up a copy of a book of his called The Savage Day. I'd never heard of Higgins or the book, but it was published by Fawcett, so I figured I'd give it a try. I liked it a lot, and Higgins went on my list of authors to look for. I read and enjoyed Toll for the Brave, The Last Place God Made, A Prayer for the Dying, Night Judgment at Sinos, Wrath of the Lion and The Sicilian Heritage. One day I picked up A Game for Heroes by someone named "James Graham." I hadn't read more than a couple of pages before I realized that Graham was almost certainly Higgins, and that proved to be the case. So I bought The Wrath of God, The Khufra Run, and The Run to Morning. Every one of them a winner.

This reflection on Higgins was brought on by my re-reading of The Wrath of God, which is now being published under the Higgins name. Higgins' real name is apparently Harry Patterson, and he's published under that name, too, as well as "Hugh Marlowe." As it turns out, I'd read one of the Marlowe books back in the middle '60s but hadn't been particularly impressed. I haven't been impressed with a lot of Higgins' work since The Eagle Has Landed, for that matter, but I still read one of his newer books now and then. They're not a patch on the ones I've mentioned, though.

1 comment:

The Eagle Has Landed blew me away in high school. Simply a masterful work. The movie version was an uneven disappointment, that didn't really deliver the suspense it should've. Higgins' later work hasn't impressed me much, either.